John de Gray - in Ireland

In Ireland

By 1209 de Gray was in Ireland serving as the king's governor, an office sometimes referred to as justiciar for Ireland. One possible reason for his appointment was to save him from being accused of ignoring the interdict on England. As a bishop, it was de Gray's ecclesiastical duty to enforce the interdict, but by going to Ireland, which was not under interdict, he could continue to serve the king without provoking the papacy. De Gray's chief policy in Ireland was to extend English rule, to which end he was involved in battles on the River Shannon and in Fermanagh. He also replaced the Irish coinage with English, and attempted unsuccessfully to make English laws applicable in Ireland. De Gray's term of office in Ireland coincided with a time of change in Irish governmental practices.

During King John's persecution of William de Braose in 1209, William Marshall gave de Braose shelter on his Irish lands. De Gray demanded that Marshall surrender de Braose to him as a traitor, but Marshall refused, claiming that since he held some lands from de Braose, it would be an act of treason to surrender his lord to an outside authority. Marshall's refusal does not seem to have embittered de Gray however, as three years later the bishop was praising him in a letter to King John.

John led an expedition to Ireland in 1210 in an effort to bring the Anglo-Norman barons under control. He opened talks with the native Irish kings, and some accounts state that his negotiations were so successful that the native Irish submitted to him. In contrast, the historian Seán Duffy has argued that the native Irish nobility were just as resistant to the king as the Anglo-Norman barons. After John's return to England he ordered de Gray to build three new castles in Connacht, one of them at Athlone. Associated with the castle building were two military invasions of Connacht by the royal government – one from Meath and Leinster and the other from Munster. De Gray left Ireland in 1211 to lead a military campaign against the Welsh, leaving his deputy Richard de Tuit in charge of the country.

De Gray also faced resistance from the northern Irish. In 1212 he led a campaign against Áed Méith, in the promotion of which he constructed castles at Cáer Uisce, Belleek, and Clones, bases for raids against the Ua Néill territory in the north. A naval campaign was also launched, but to no avail. De Gray suffered a defeat at the hands of Cormac O'Melaghlin in 1212 at Fircal, Offaly, and left Ireland the following year. He continued to hold the office of governor for a time, but by July 1213 he had been replaced by Henry de Loundres, the Archbishop of Dublin. One of de Gray's final acts as justiciar was to take a force of Irish knights to England to help repel a threatened invasion by the French king, Philip Augustus.